While consumers happily “Netflix and chill,” the state of digital media within schools, libraries, and other educational institutions is anything but “chill.”

Instead of purchasing to own and lend, libraries and universities are forced to pay for ballooning subscription costs that put significant restrictions on their ability to serve the public and make it impossible for libraries and schools to fulfill their missions. Despite enormous digital inequity, music, film, and even printed materials are increasingly licensed to stream rather than own, creating a tax on the public that disproportionately affects those with less access to resources. As libraries see their collections of digital media dwindle and the right to educational use is stripped by streaming corporations, we ask ourselves: Will we ever achieve equitable access in streaming media?

This session was hosted by Library Futures and the Internet Archive and features a conversation between Kathleen DeLaurenti, Director, Arthur Friedheim Music Library at Johns Hopkins University; Kris Paulsen, Associate Professor of Art History at The Ohio State University; and Courtney Cook, PhD., Manager of Education at POV/American Documentary. This panel was moderated by Rick Prelinger, professor at University of California, Santa Cruz and founder of the Prelinger Archives.